A couple of weeks ago Motorola held a promotion where consumers could test a Moto X for two weeks before deciding whether to keep the handset or not. Now, Motorola has done a bit in the last year to shake up smartphone conventions, but there is another US company that has taken the market by the scruff of the neck. I am of course talking about T-Mobile, and now the company has gone one better than Motorola.
T-Mobile, the company that brags the Uncarrier movement that goes against other carriers and puts power with the consumer has a new trick. The company has revealed a new program called "Test Drive" which is admittedly a name that kind of gives the game away, but indulge me anyway. The program gives customers the chance to test drive a device for one week, and the device in question is none other than the iPhone 5s.
That's right, T-Mobile knows what it is doing and has selected the daddy of the smartphone world in Apple's all-conquering "i" device. Customers can sign up online and will be sent a shiny new iPhone 5s to try on for a week, returning the device after that time if they decide not to purchase it. In the sign up process users have to submit credit card details in case the phone breaks or mysteriously never comes back to T-Mobile, but nothing is charged to the card until that event.
CEO John Legere, the oft credited architect of T-Mobile's industry shaking "Uncarrier" movement, says that this latest program will be commonplace in the near future.
"This will be an industry standard in two years," Legere said, referencing the monthly contract payments that are now the industry norm, another pioneering push from T-Mobile.
T-Mobile is currently at the center of rife speculation that the company will complete a long rumoured merger with Sprint this summer. Reports suggest that Sprint will be folded into the T-Mobile brand to capitalize on the Uncarrier Company's undoubted buzz at the moment. T-Mobile may be the 4th biggest carrier in terms of subscriptions behind Sprint in 3rd, but there is no doubt that Legere has created enough heat to make T-Mobile the more valuable brand right now.